I looked over at her, and saw the authenticity in her eyes, the depth of her compassion. I couldn’t deny her that. I couldn’t tell her to stop her work just because I was irrationally and unsubstantially worried about her. Besides it wasn’t my place to be worried about her, she had made that abundantly clear.
“At least let me send a few of my Guard with you. It would make me feel so much better,” I offered and then knew I had to play a card I not only resented, but knew she would to. “Please, as your King, I need to know that all my people are as safe as they can be. I need you to be responsible.”
“Oh, I see. The King is worried about my safety,” Amelia nodded patronizingly. “And is this the same King that plans to hunt down Terletov himself?”
“Why yes it is,” I nodded, hoping to have made some progress with my side of the debate.
“How is that fair? You rule an entire Kingdom, but you’re allowed to put yourself right in the middle of the drama?” I opened my mouth to respond, but Amelia shook her head at me and continued with her rant. “What if something happened to you? How is hunting down bad guys responsible of you? I’m just attending a conference. You are putting yourself directly in the line of fire. If anyone needs to be surrounded by a bunch of Titan Guards it’s you, not me.”
“It might not be fair, but it’s the way things are. And because I rule an entire Kingdom, I’m the one that gets to make these decisions,” I argued, but when she looked at me like I was the biggest asshole on the planet I decided to explain further, to say out loud words I hadn’t even verbalized to Eden yet. “I have to go, Amelia. He’s threatening my people and the freedom I worked my ass off to give to these people,” I clarified with a passionate but infinitely softer voice. “I have been bombarded over the last eight hours with opinions on how foolish I am for going. Everyone loves to give me their opinion on what a king should do and how a king should act. But what they don’t understand is that the crown means nothing to me, less than nothing actually. It is the freedom that my people enjoy for the first time in thousands of years that keeps me where I‘m at, that made me give up my own personal freedom so that they feel safe. And I would give it all up, all of this wealth and power; I would sacrifice everything, even my own life if I needed to, just to ensure that they stay free.”
“Oh,” Amelia looked up at me with wide eyes and I realized that I stopped walking.
And that she stayed.
“Yes, the people need freedom, but they also need you Avalon,” she practically whispered and I felt her words burning in my core. She was right. But it was more complicated than that. “You’re their King. The first King in our history that has let them live their lives without governing each and every little detail.”
“That’s not true, they have Eden and Kiran,” I countered, searching her eyes for where her argument was coming from. Did she say these things because she actually cared about me? Or was she just compassionate enough to be tapped into the pulse of the Kingdom?
“They’re not the same and you know that. Besides they haven’t even been around these last few years. Why you? Why does it have to be you that goes?” She demanded.
And because her eyes had turned steely with her demands and her lips had pursed into a frown, because she wasn’t going to accept any kind of bullshit answer and because for the first time ever I wanted to be honest with a girl that wasn’t my sister, I was, I was completely honest.
“Because I’m afraid to stay,” I whispered, scared if I said it too loud even the trees would laugh at me.
“You? You’re afraid of something?” Amelia gasped, clearly disbelieving.
I laughed humorlessly, hardly believing I just admitted that out loud. But I was too far into this to stop now. “Yes! I’m terrified of staying here. I’m terrified that I’m going to live forever and at twenty-one years old I’m already bored to death! I don’t get to die. I have this whole future laid out for eternity and I’m terrified I am going to have to suffer through it bored and alone…. And I’m even more afraid that I’m addicted to this dangerous lifestyle and what that will mean for me if I really can keep my promise of peace. I have to go on this mission. I have to sort through all the bullshit in my head and find myself again. Because I cannot stay here any longer and endure this monotony while other people go and fight my battles.”
I finished with a huge breath of relief, exhaling all of the pent up craziness that had been stewing inside me for way to long.
Amelia just looked at me for a long time as if trying to figure out whether I was telling the truth or not. I could have promised her it was the most honest I had been in my entire life, but I decided to let her come to her own conclusions.
“They won’t understand that,” she answered sadly. “They won’t want you to go.”
I ignored her and asked my own question.
“What do you want, Amelia?” I looked down at her, silently demanding that her eyes meet mine. I was rewarded with an intense gaze that saw all the way through me. She had come to her own conclusions about me and for the first time since she walked back into my life I began to hope that whatever this was that I felt was not so one-sided.
“Avalon, you should not call me Amelia,” she practically begged. My eyes drifted to the sexy lines of her throat as she visibly swallowed.
I took a step closer to her, our bodies nearly touching. “What do you want, Amelia?” my voice dropped to a lower timber that rumbled in the air between us and not completely on purpose, but I was readying myself for a whole new kind of battle and I wanted to be as prepared as I could.